Sand
by HoVis
Summary: Superman looks at the surf, the sea and the sand, and realises something both about himself and the whole of humanity. Slight companion piece to Musings. Please R and R!


**A/N:** You know I really don't know what keeps coming over me. I really need to either lighten up or get a social life! Anyway I was at the beach today, looking at the grains of sand, and when I got home I wrote this, in a rather similar vein to "Musings on Mortality". I hope it's alright!

**Disclaimer:** I do not own the characters, or even the sand which inspired this.

**Sand**

Superman stared at the sand, each grain as different to its neighbour as any human from another to his hyper-sensitive eyes. Sand was, he mused, a curious phenomenon – a collection of miniscule stones, acting whilst dry as a liquid, flowing and sinking together. Somewhat like humanity.

He was standing in a deserted cove, and for a moment he felt as free and naked as the shifting grains beneath his feet. There was no one in sight to pretend to, no one in earshot to rescue, and no doubts in his mind or his spirit at all. He felt a small smile cross his lips. Not even Superman could survive indefinitely without a rest, a moment or a week alone, to let the cool balm of silence wash away the effects of the grindstone of reality.

He glanced back down at the grains of sand, strangely heartened by the metaphor he drew between them and the people of his precious, adopted planet. Humans were battered every day by misfortune and tragedy, just as the sand was constantly harangued by the cold lick of the sea. The sand always settled back into place, and humans always rose out of disasters, a little chipped and worn, perhaps, but stronger for it.

Superman had been feeling tired, the past few weeks, the sight of far-too-young emergency workers striving on with endless reserves of energy exhausting even him a little. Lately he had been working at a sprint, rather than the long-distance marathon he was used to, and looking in the mirror one morning he admitted that the cracks were beginning to show. Perhaps it _was_ time to slow down slightly. Still, he cringed at the thought of the saying that it was good to "grow old gracefully". He was not vain but had come to realise that he could not imagine _not_ living his life the way he did – the evening and early morning rescues were as much a part of his regular day as dashing around after "Mad Dog Lane" at the Daily Planet.

"I don't know," he murmured to the sand, "what would I be, if I were just a grain of sand, rather than a sea defence?" A sharp voice behind him jerked him from his reverie.

"A sea defence? What on earth are you talking about, Clark?"

Clark Kent almost fell over his feet in genuine surprise. Lois had crept up on him a little too well – perhaps his philosophising was getting _too_ deep.

"Uh – hi, Lois, I was just enjoying the view and thinking... that it might be... ruined if they didn't... get a few sea defences?" He shrugged helplessly, and Lois rolled her eyes. She was more than a grain of sand, Clark thought; she was a rock, indomitable against the storm of life. More than that, she was _his_ rock, but that she knew it.

"Okay, Clark, it's time to go – I cannot _believe_ Perry has got us on a case at a _sea resort_, for heaven's sake – so the sooner we crack it, the better?"

Clark grinned. Lois hated the silence almost as much as he revelled in it. For her, silence meant a lack of discovery, a lack of truth. What she didn't realise that it was only with the help of silence that the real truths – the ones about people and about self – could be unearthed.

"Sure thing, Lois." He glanced back out at the sea, letting it wash over his mind and thoughts one last time. "I'll catch you up." Then, seeing her dubious expression, he added; "_Really_."

Lois shook her head hopelessly and left him to his sea-watching. He listened to her heartbeat, a sound more sacred to him than silence, and he heard her chuckle and mutter;

"Clark Kent. _Honestly_."

Clark Kent looked back out at the calm sea, and felt the sun's rays on his arms, not burning but caressing. Then, as he was about to finally bid his farewell to his sandy cove of solitude, he glanced down and spotted one tiny speck of black among the white sand, a different coloured granite fleck. He recalled dimly the dronings of his high school English teacher about extended metaphors, and wondered if it was really sensible to try and apply one about sand to his life and his world, then decided he didn't much care, because that one speck of black sand had made him realise something.

He wasn't a sea defence, or a rock, or anything special, because he still couldn't do anything _without_ every other being on the planet, the people he had perhaps arrogantly thought of as only grains of sand. Either they were all like him, defences in their own particular way, or he was another grain of sand, a different colour, a different species, but still working in lock-step with every other grain, each one affecting him as much as he affected them.

He sighed.

"Clark Kent," he muttered, "you really _do_ need to stop thinking so much."

He rose, dusted his hands off and walked out of the cove and straight into a tourist's heaven, a commercialized resort complete with plastic palm trees and milling with excited holidaymakers. Beside one of those palm trees stood an impatient Lois Lane, her tap footing and her fingers itching, he was sure, for a story to type. He wondered why she had seemed so hesitant to join him in the cove, that true haven amidst the chaos of people trying to live, and yet be so eager to be rid of the noise and havoc outside of it.

"Lois!" He called, waving and smiling an especially cheerful – she would have labelled it goofy – smile. Not far from him a woman stormed away from her husband, and in a hotel room high above him a child cried and a receptionist tightened in grief as her 'true' love announced he was leaving her via a simple phone call, and Superman realised something else. Life was always painful, no matter who you were, and everyone had days when they couldn't function unless they topped up on sunshine, or chocolate, or love, or whatever it was that made humans and Kryptonians continue to go out to work and life each morning. Every grain of sand took its turn in the dry calm, whilst they also took their turn under the merciless beating of the waves.

Clark jogged over to Lois, who rolled her eyes, the finest grain of sand on the beach. He gave her an apologetic glance.

"Sorry. I was a bit distracted back there." Then, before Lois could make any remark, cutting or otherwise, he continued; "Let's go do our job."

Silently, he added;

_Just like everyone else. Before the sea takes us again, before we take our final turn._

888

**A/N:** Please tell me what you think!


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